Lifelong learning
Lifelong learning is a matter of course for good tattoo artists. Learn from the sketchbooks and tutorials of great tattoo masters or explore the history of your art in all its facets! Under Tattoo Media at Tattoosafe you will find a huge selection of books and TattooSoul DVDs that will give you lots of inspiration for your own work and can also help you to better understand your customers' wishes.
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From A - Z: The topics in our Tattoosafe library
In which field would you like to educate yourself? For a better overview, we have pre-sorted the different tattoo styles and motifs for you from A-Z according to categories:
Asian: Dragons, tigers, snakes, koi, geishas, cherry blossoms and much more - you will find many interesting books on Asian, Japanese, Far Eastern or Oriental styles. Explore these characteristic tattoo motifs!
Black & Grey: Shaded or in pure black, as dotwork or tribal, there is an abundance of styles that open up a wide range of design possibilities for you. Discover the variety of what is possible in one color!
Chicano & Gangster: The "Chicanos", the Mexicans who immigrated to the USA, shaped their very own, bi-cultural art style that has been triumphant since the 1960s, from graffiti on the wall to tattoos.
Comics: Asterix, Donald Duck, Batman & co., but also manga heroes, pin ups and much more are usually presented in a cheerful and colorful, but sometimes also dark and oppressive comic style. We hope you enjoy browsing through our Sketch Books!
Angels & Demons: Skulls, catrinas, angels, devils and demons are very popular tattoo motifs. We show you what is possible in several selected works. Here you can dive deep into the world of the occult and the morbid!
Mandala & Graphic: Dotwork is the technique of choice not only for mandala motifs but also for the currently very popular jewellery tattoos. But even strictly geometric figures get a special magic when finely dotted.
Maori, Polynesian, Tribal: The traditional body ornaments of the Maori, Polynesians or Samoans, which originally indicated tribal affiliation, now dynamically define the bodies of your customers with their typical curved lines.
New School: The tattoo style that does not feel obliged to any tradition and does not attach much importance to a deeper symbolic meaning of its motifs, simply wants to be fun - for example through bright colors, strong contrasts and daring contour lines.
Fonts & Symbols: From a single word to a short text - no tattoo artist can avoid the task of well engraved lettering, because there will always be someone who wants their parents' names or their beloved poem on their skin.
Traditional & Old School: This style, also known as "American Style" or "Sailor Tattoos", looks quite plain and rustic. Its hallmarks are bright colors, thick outlines and a simple, two-dimensional motif design.
Karl Finke Buch No. 3: Greetz from St. Pauli
Fans of old school tattoos will be especially thrilled by the Flash Book of Hamburg tattoo artist Karl Finke, because this "original album" from 1927 is a real rarity!
As part of a research project on the history of tattooing with a focus on Christian Warlich, the "forefather of German tattoo artists" (1891-1964), the Dresden Institute for Saxon History and Folklore also came across a sketch book by the Hamburg tattoo artist Karl Finke (1866-1935). This book was then published by Ole Wittmann as a facsimile with accompanying texts in German and English.
Together with Christian Warlich, Karl Finke is considered a protagonist of the early Hamburg tattoo scene. His designs, sketched with ink and watercolors, may often seem naïve and crude from today's perspective - but they are a fascinating contemporary document that tells an important chapter of your industry: They take you back to St. Pauli around a hundred years ago, when Hamburg's tattoo artists roamed the pubs with such pattern books and persuaded drunken sailors, militant workers or even prostitutes to have a piece of jewellery quickly engraved. They are documents of a time when "tattooed ladies" could be admired as sideshows in the circus and loyalty oaths to the distant sweetheart, but also the fear of the "sailor's grave" sea adorned the sailor's arms. In addition to working in his own "tattoo establishment" at Große Marienstraße 8 in Altona, Finke also travelled around with the circus for a time as a wrestler. His colorful life is expressed in the designs as well as the traditional motifs and symbols of his time, some of which - such as guild signs or national flags - are hardly used today.
The bilingual texts on Karl Finke's Book No. 3 help you to analyse the album. They place Finke's work in cultural history, trace Anglo-American influences and also shed light on the significance of tattoos for the art of the German painter Otto Dix.
The book, very elaborately designed in collaboration with the Leipzig Academy of Visual Arts, was financed through crowdfunding (pre-orders) in 2017. In 2019, Karl Finke Book No. 3 won the German Design Award. The jury explained its decision as follows: "The book about the once most famous tattoo artist of St. Pauli impresses formally with a great choice of paper and the clear design. But the publication is also convincing in terms of content, giving the viewer a good impression of the art of tattooing in the first half of the 20th century through the illustrated template motifs."
Shop the Karl Finke Book No. 3 by Ole Wittmann now!
Blacktop Tattooing Edition 1: Masterpieces from all over Europe
Old school as blackwork is perhaps a little unusual - but decidedly appealing, as the nobly black hardcover-bound Blacktop Tattooing Edition 1 shows. With its glossy embossing and impressive size of 27 x 37 cm, it is sure to become an imposing eye-catcher in your studio library.
On 216 pages, the book edited by Gabriele Greco ("The Good Fellas Tattoo") brings together selected masterpieces of the traditional style created by 99 of the best tattoo artists in Europe. The artists each contributed a large-format motif for the chest or back. It is precisely this commonality (Traditional Style in Black & Gray) that makes the individual differences in the tattoo artists' working methods all the more striking.
Here you will find, among others, imaginative surreal designs by Alberto Triguero from Spain, Joel Soos from Sweden and many more, religious designs by Sindre Olsen from Norway or Richard Lazenby from the UK, romantic designs by Guiseppe Presta from Italy or American Traditionals by Kirill Muza from the Ukraine and Jaca from France. Oriental, death and wildlife, creepy like the Skulls by Job de Quay or Pedro Soos, naïve symbolic by Joshua Rogers, punky by Moira Ramone, Japanese, erotic, even a charming tattoo bra ... Every time you leaf through, you will always discover new and very inspiring details!
It is also exciting to observe how the classic old-school motifs - from the butterfly to the mourner on the cross - have refined and changed over the last 100 years compared to more rustic tattoo pioneers like Karl Finke.
Bullet BG – Digital Artwork: State-of-the-art perfektion
The book Bullet BG - Digital Artwork, a collection of 50 unique digital tattoo designs by Bulgarian tattoo artist Bullet BG, who now lives and works in Portugal, takes you into a completely different world of images. Electronically masterfully manipulated and composed, flashes were created here that should be a real challenge to stitch!
The fear of the merciless passing of time, the various facets of grief, the fluid boundary between humans and animals, the war in the mind, as we all experience it with almost unbearable intensity since 24 February 2022 ... In Bullet BG's digital sketch book, unique combinations of beauty, illness, transience and death await you. Expressive faces that merge seamlessly with sculls and an almost too extreme realism provide fascinated goosebumps. Religious and mythological motifs also blend seamlessly into this magical-morbid scenario as sculptures of terrific plasticity.
The special feature: Each copy of this softcover edition in A4 format that you order from Tattoosafe is exclusively numbered and hand-signed by the artist.
Shop the Bullet BG - Digital Artwork Book now!
Would you also like to make a statement about these or other media from the large Tattoosafe range? Then we look forward to your personal review as a comment to this post!
